Can you match the name
with the picture? Rock Hudson, Leonard Bernstein, John Rechy, Tab Hunter, Richard Chamberlain,
Larry Kramer, Jerry Herman, Steve Sondheim, Felice Picano??? Do you know who they are? Have you
read their biographies,
autobiographies? Do these pictures below make you more interested in
them?

You probably will
recognize the names Harvey Fierstein and Roddy McDonald and I am sure you know Oscar Wilde, Noel Coward and, possibly
E.M. Forester but do you know how they lived as gay men at a time when gays were
imprisoned just for being gay? Do the names Mart Crowley and/or Tony Kushner ring a bell? Do you know how they
changed attitudes toward gay people? Do you know who George Cukor is/was?

These are people who have
made it possible for YOU to even think of gay marriage, to have children as a
same sex couple, to sue for discrimination on the job, to make it possible for
to come out of the closet, to love another man out in the open--they are your
gay 'fathers' and gay 'grandfathers' and YOU should know who they are/were, the
lives they lead. You have to know about those who felt they had to live in the closet, like Liberace,
or couldn't say, "I am gay," like Charles Nelson Reilly or David Hyde Pierce
even though it was known they were.

All these guys made it
possible for 'Doogie Howser' to comer
out and publicly talk about his lover as have Cheyenne Jackson and John Barrowman.

You are taught history in school but not gay
history, not about people like Harvey Milk, who changed your life.
Someone has to keep these names, their histories, alive and it is up to you but
you have to know their stories, their histories to do that for the generations
coming along now.

Yes, many are in show business but there are an
equal amount of military men, business men, politicians, artists,  men in all
walks of life, including bloggers, who have/will tell their stories
and depend upon you to carry them on.

Get to the library, or a bookstore, and get a gay
bio, a book about/by Jerome Robbins, Dan Daily or the hundreds, yes hundreds, of
books by and/or about gay people, including:

Hey, I had to get a plug in!!!

PS Donna, I will leave it up to you to educate gay
men about all the gay women who have helped shape the lives of gay people!!!

BY THE WAY FEEL FREE TO ADD ANY NAMES YOU THINK ARE
IMPORTANT!!!